David Klamen

New Paintings

Chicago

March 29 – May 5, 2007

Richard Gray Gallery presents a one-man exhibition of paintings by David Klamen at The ADAA Art Show 2007, February 22 - 26, 2007, booth C4, Seventh Regiment Armory on Park Avenue at 67th Street, New York City. This exhibition will then travel to the Chicago gallery at 875 North Michigan Avenue, March 29 - May 5. There will be an opening reception for the artist on Thursday, March 29, from 5:00pm - 7:00pm.

This group of new paintings, painted in oil on canvas and on paper, continues the artist's exploration of memory and perception. At first glance the twilight landscapes appear decidedly romantic. However, on closer inspection the exquisitely rendered and hauntingly beautiful pastoral imagery is merely a veneer to what is more accurately a reminiscence of the much more local and mundane urban park. This deception is not done at the viewer's expense, but to compel awareness and cause the viewer to question our assumptions of how in fact we understand what we see. With a nod to minimalism, Klamen adds the reductive geometry of dots and lines to obscure the landscapes - further forcing consciousness by preventing entry into the idyllic countryside. The genre of landscape is merely the artist's means to explore external memories. For Klamen, landscapes are "...an answer to the question, what is the most fundamental thing that I remember that's outside, rather than inside, that's external, rather than internal? For me, basic fundamental memories have to do with the environment surrounding me."

Klamen's paintings are in many distinguished collections, such as: the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Born 1961, in Dixon Illinois, Klamen received his MFA in painting from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1985. He is a Professor of Fine Arts at Indiana University Northwest and has been exhibiting with Richard Gray Gallery since 1993. David Klamen continues to live and work in Chicago.